ICONOCLAST1999

"What are you thinking?" When my younger sister asked me, my mind was somewhere else. We were in my father's car and were heading home from the Kimpo airport in Seoul. I had just arrived Seoul from the United States, and it was raining so hard. My younger sister was asking me about my trip, and my father was worried about the traffic due to severe rain. Answering them casually, I was asking myself this crazy question. 'What is missing?'

After the spring semester, I was homesick for the first time ever since I came to the U.S. I was relieved from a great amount of pressure from the finals, and homesickness was about to get me with all its stupid temptation. It began from longing for Korean traditional dishes. Since I lived with an American family, I was not able to cook Korean cuisine very often. I believed I was quite OK with it. However, once I began to miss Korean dishes, I became almost sick because I could not eat any other dishes. Elite Korean dishes did not bother me at all. The cheap dishes, which I enjoyed on the street or in the lousy restaurants, were reminded of me lots of memories. I remembered the streets in Seoul where the restaurants or coffee shops were, the conversation that I had with my friends eating the dishes, and I even came to remember my first love! My memories were vivid. The sun was brighter, and the trees were greener in my memory. I lost all my appetite with the memories. Nothing was like the Korean dishes I missed. Therefore, when I was finally able to get back home after the summer session, it was like emancipation to me.

It was a long trip taking about 20 hours. When the flight was flying over Japan, the TV screen was turned on so that the passengers could see where we were flying then, and how much longer it was going to take. For an hour until I finally arrived at Kimpo airport, I stared at the screen as if I would like to eat it. As soon as the seat belt lamp was off, I jumped out from my seat and got my backpack and laptop from the overheard cabinet. However, I had to wait until all of the first class passengers slowly took off. Even after I got off the flight, I had to wait for my baggage. My stupid baggage came out so late as usual. I sighed a lot because I was anxious. At last, everything was all set. I had my baggage and passed customs. All I needed to do was pushing the cart and passing the gate, and my family would wait for me there.

As I was passing the gate, I quickly looked around to find my family, but I could not see them. I looked around again, but I could still not see them. I glared at one spot. Last time, when I visited, they were standing there, but this time, I did not see them there. Where did they go? After a few minutes (it might be only a minute), I found my younger sister and father on the other side of the gate. My younger sister was talking on her cellular phone, and so was my father. She waived her hand to me, and father was smiling. Yes, I had got back home after the long trip. However, pushing the cart toward them, I felt that something was wrong. On the way back home, I kept thinking what was wrong but still did not know the answer.

My family moved in a new place while I was in the States. It was one of the huge apartment towns. There were more than one hundred buildings (twenty-fifth story) in the town, and our new apartment was in the 12^th floor. Although the place was newly modeled, I felt so strange when I first stepped in the place. Everything in the apartment was light green and white color. Our old place was decorated dark brown inside because of it's narutal wood, and outside was gray because of stone color. Compared with our old house, I felt this new place is too bright.

Other than that, everything was supposed to be better. Because my older brother's family lived in the next building, my sister-in-law could take care of my father easier. Moreover, there were all variety of stores inside of the town: hospitals, a bank, a beauty shop, video shops, convenience stores, restaurants, grocery stores, bakery stores, etc. We did not have to drive to go grocery shopping. However, I did not like it at all. My new place did not have its own character, and I had to use an elevator all the time. When I lived in the house, our old place, I used to take a cab off on the main street and walked on the smaller street to go home. Every night whenever I got back home, I could think whatever came to my mind as I saw the houses, street lamps, stores, and people. However, in this new place, I got off the cab right beside of the aprtment complex or at the parking lot. When I got in the elevator right away, I became all alone at once.

This does not mean I was unhappy all the time while I was in Seoul. I enjoyed lots of things while I was with my family. First of all, I enjoyed lots of delicious Korean dishes. I was able to eat all varieties of Kimchies, (Kimchi is very traditional Korean food, which is very spicy but also very tasty and usually made of cabbage) whenever I wanted to. Cabbage Kimchi, radish Kimchi, water Kimchi, cucumber Kimchi, green onion Kimchi, etc. Every Saturday evening, I went out to eat with my family. We had raw fish, BBQ Kalbee (beef or pork ribs), and Nang-Mun (cold noodles, typical summer dish). Since I ate a lot, I gained more than two pounds.

I also was able to speak in Korean all the time. While I was in the US, I did not have to speak in Korean, in which I can express myself better. I felt so much freer by using my first language. Almost every evening, I went out with my friends. We went out to the coffee shops and talked about what happened while I was away. We talked about our schooldays. We laughed a lot about it although those memories were painful at the time. We all agreed that time was so fast. Some of my friends were married, some of my friends were divorced, and some of my friends were working for new careers. Whatever we went through, life made us keep going, and we still did not know what was coming next. Then suddenly we realized that we all had become grown-ups.

My niece was adorable. While I was away, she started to speak. Even though she spoke mostly nonsense words, it was amazing to me. Since I did not see her every day, I felt like she skipped some of the development stages and appeared as a kid rather than a baby. I called her, 'a small person' and used formal expressions (There are 6 stages of formal to informal expressions in Korean) to her because I respected her world so much. However, she always used informal expressions to me because she was not able to figure out the difference between formal and informal expressions. Whenever I asked her if she was a princess, she answered me that she was a prince. I asked her who I was-I thought she would call me a princess. However, she simply said, 'You're my crown. Let's go to look for a princess, my crown.' Then I had to go everywhere to look for a princess. I did not have any idea where the princess was. My niece also seemed not to know, so we had to go almost everywhere in the town.

Being in Seoul with my family gave me security and warmth. However, I still kept looking for something else. I asked myself what was missing. Something was driving me crazy, but I did not know the reason.

Right before I left Korea to come back to the US, I had to go to my old town to close my bank account. When I got out of the bank, I walked to my old house unconsciously. I had lived in the place 17 years, and the house was not a just place to live. AlI important things in my life happened in that place. The house knows my sadness, happiness, anger, joy, hope, and desperation, and I grew up there. I found myself standing in front of the house. Then I suddenly felt all memories came back.

One summer day, the touch-me-not flower bloomed. The seeds came to the flower bed by the wind. My mother was so glad, and she wanted us to dye our nails with the flowers. My sister, She, and I dyed our nails all through the summer. My mother told us a story-if the dyed nail remains until the first snow came, our first love would become true. Although I was not allowed to have a boyfriend at the time, my heart throbbed because of the sweet sound of 'first love.'

The branch from the lilac tree almost reached my bedroom window in the third floor. When I was in high school, one nameless bird came to the branch every early morning and sang. I hated it because I had to stay at school 13 hours per day for studying a Korea SAT test. The night was always too short to refresh me. I was always tired, and I was alwasy mad at my mother over small things. I knew she would not scold me for that. One day, I threw something at the bird, and after that, it never came back. When my mother asked me why she could not hear the bird singing anymore, I answered, 'I don't know, mom. The birds are capricious.'

Every fall, jujube trees in our garden had too many jujubes, so we had to pick them up before the branches broke because of the weight of the fruits. Jujubes are very traditional fruits in Korea because they are used for making healthy tea with ginseng and are also used in every memorials for our ancestors and holidays . My mother used to steam them and dry them under the fall sunshine. Then we would have the best quality of jujubes for the next one year. Usually my mother shook the trees, and I would wait until they fell down to the ground. They I picked them up. But sometimes, my mother shook the braches while I was still under the tree. Then the ripe jujubes often hit me. I used to yell at her. 'Umma(mom), I know you did it on purpose. Don't blame me if I became dumb. The cells in my brain are dying because of these jujubes.' My mother laughed and said, 'What can I say? Be a nice daughter. Then you'll not have any reason to be hit by these jujubes.'

I looked at my old bedroom windows. I wrote the poem, 'My Room Is Cold' there. At that time, I was getting through puberty, and I thought nothing new was out there in this world. I came to know nothing was eternal, and happiness was nothing but a moment. I felt like my childhood was gone, and I became so lonely. After that time I can never overcome the feeling of coldness. I began to lock my bedroom door whenever I was in and did not care about other family members. I immersed deep inside of myself and acted like I knew everything although I did not know anything about life.

I looked around. The children were playing on the street. Suddenly, I realized that I was crying. I remembered when I came back home last winter. It was my first visit ever since I went to the US. One day, when I was coming home, and I heard somebody calling my name. I turned around, and I saw my mother was running to me calling my name. 'Umma?' I stopped and waited for her to come. She tried to catch her breath and held my hands. 'I knew it was you! I doubted it a little bit, but it was you. Do you know how much I'm glad I can call your name like this? While you were gone, I often saw you on this street. Now you're here, and I can call your name.' Her face was glowing with happiness, and she laughed a lot.

I could not keep her laugh forever. On September 1998, my mother called me and said she missed me a lot. She said she had to see me right away. I told her that I still needed to study, and I could not help her emptiness. 'Mom, just hang in there for two more months. Then I can go there. Even if you come here, I won't have time for you. I'm busy. Moreover, can you handle the long trip?' She did not wait for me two months. She passed away on October 6^th, 1998, and I was not able to see her smile anymore.

I walked for a long time that day, and I realized what I had missed. When I pushed the cart through the gate at the airport, I was still looking for my mother unconsciously. I knew she could not be there, but I imagined her standing over there. She should have waited me there and clung to me crying with joy. What I did not like about our new apartment was not the bright color of it. To be honest, I never liked that dark color of my old house. It was because I did not see the huge family picture, which was hanging on the wall at my place more then 10 years, in the new place. I should have seen my mother's face looking at me. What drove me crazy for fifteen days while I was in Seoul was that I could not feel that I was at home. My mother was not there.

I remembered one of the tough days. That day, I called my mother but could not say anything. I just said, 'Umma,' and began to cry. My mother did not ask anything. She just said, 'Kyung-Ae, my dear daughter. I'm here for you. Just come back home. Everything is going to be OK if you remember this one thing. You can come home any time you want. That's why I'm here.' Like an angry child who asks all or nothing, now I say I do not have a home anymore. If people ask me how I came to lose my home, I might say that my mother was my very last home, and I lost her.

When I came back home late last Sunday night, I saw answering machine's light was blinking. I pushed the play button without a thought. Among other unimportant messages, I heard my father's voice. Since he hardly ever called me, I stopped doing something else and listened to it. 'This is your dad. How are you doing? Is it hard to study? Are you eating properly? I just call you to see if you are doing okay. By the way, Jee-Hyun, your sister, is getting married in March 11th. I thought you wanted to know. Take care.'

My younger sister is getting married. Yes, she is. Of course I knew since I badly wanted her to get marry, and that was what I insisted when I visited Seoul last summer. I just did not know the exact date, but it made me excited as if I never expected to hear it. It would be 9 am in Seoul, so my sister would be at work. I called her at work immediately. 'Hey, I heard of the news! Congratulations! So you're getting married, huh? Tell me what's going on.' Unlike my excitement, she seemed to be bored about the subject. 'Well, everything is going okay, I guess. We're looking for a place where we will live after marriage, and it's not easy.'

Since Seoul is a very crowded city, it is always hard to find a place to live for a young couple. Moreover, some apartments, which are located in a better area of the city, cost over 300, 000 dollars, so it is not easy to find a place, and it is also a common problem.

'Don't worry. You'll find a place anyhow. Just try not to be picky. Anyway, tell me what you want me to get for you. Do you want money or a gift?' She is my younger sister whom I love so much. In fact, she was the best thing to happen in my life until my niece was born. Therefore, my intention to give something for her marriage was very important to me. However, she said, 'It's okay. You're a just student. If you spend money for me, family here has to send the money back to you, so it's all same.'

'No, it's not like that. I'm working. I've been saving some money for you. If you don't want money, I'll buy a music system.'

'You know, I already have mine.'

'What are you talking about? It's a small one!'

'In fact, I'm going to get our old one in the living room.'

'But you didn't like it.'

'I've changed my mind. I like that one very much. I'm dusting the music system everyday.'

Somehow, she was making me feel bad. Have I not noticed her change? She was not like this at least last winter when I went home for vacation. Whenever new calendars came out, she always circled with a color pen around her birthday. Her birthday was counted 30 days before it actually came, and almost everyday, she made sure if we would remember what we should buy for her. We used to make fun of this. Even when she was a college student, she always put a big sock on her bedroom door to get 100 dollars from our father on Christmas although he was a half Buddhist. My father used to assure that he would not give her any extra money, but he always could not keep his assurance. He used to shake his head after giving money to her and said, 'She got me again, gosh.' She was that kind of girl whom we could not resist. However this time, I had to convince her that I should get something for her marriage. Otherwise I would not be happy with that. What happened to her while I was away? Did my "forever child" sister become a grown up?

Jee-Hyun is four years younger than me. She was a very special girl since she was a tiny baby. I remember when she was 2 years old. Her hair, the crown on her head, never wanted to lie down, so my mother had to tie it up. The tail on her head looked like a fountain, and I always loved to touch her soft baby hair. She loved egg cookies. She ate the cookies with her only three or four front teeth in a variety of ways. For instance, she would put it in her little bitty of a mouth and let it melt in her mouth. She would crack it and bit it, or she would scratch it with her front teeth. Whenever I got back home from school, she sat on the living room floor and was eating the egg cookies in her favorite ways.

She had this panda bear doll. Like a real panda, it had black and white hair and stuck out its red tongue. She always had to have this panda around her. When my mother was about throw it away, she ran into me and cried. My mother explained that it was too old and was worn out, but we never understood the explanation because it did not look old to us. I cried with my sister asking her not to throw it away. When my mother threw it away anyway, I almost hated her. However when I remember it again now, she must be right since my sister had it for a long time, and she never wanted to have another doll. Actually, at that time, the bear already had lost one of its eyes and a tongue.

When other babies, who were her age, began to crawl, she never wanted to crawl. She just sat with her diaper on and moved while she was sitting. I looked at her moving with amusement. Why could she not crawl like other babies? Was she ever going to crawl? Therefore, one day, when she stood up and started to walk, it was another amazing. She was the one who could skip a normal growing step.

She was a very, very pretty girl. Actually she still is. She had white skin like the snow white, a little mouth like a cherry, and silky hair. She knew well that she was pretty. When we had our grandmother's 60th birthday party, one of our uncles asked her if he could take a picture of her. She tottered to a tree in the garden and held one leaf of the tree with one hand and the edge of her pink dress with another hand as if she was a movie star. Then she said, 'I'm ready.' She was only four years old. Everybody in the party said she would be a famous actress or model someday.

I believe that it was a main reason that she had so many boy friends. When she went to kindergarten for the first time, she came back with her first official boy friend. She was holding his hand proudly and said, 'This is my boy friend, sister.' He had very round and fat cheeks just like hers. After that, I had to hear the sentence, 'This is my boy friend,' many times. She introduced most of her boy friends to me. There was always someone who was special to her and who treated her special. Therefore, one night, she came into my bedroom and kicked me out of the bed and said, 'Why haven't you married?' I was not surprised (In Korea, the younger sister was supposed to wait until her elder sister is married. My sister used to say BMW could not run fast because of a lousy car in front of it. According to her, she was the BMW, and I was the lousy car). I just looked at her getting out of my bedroom. Because I was too sleepy, I could not figure out what had just happened.

When she was in 5th grade in grammar school, I found her with a bunch of boys in the living room when I got back home from school. She looked at me and said, 'We are practicing for our school play. I'm going to play a princess. These are my friends who will play other roles. Why don't you prepare snacks for us?' In fact, she was the only female among them, and of course her role should be a princess.

Another surprising thing about her happened when she was six years old. She hardly ever talked. Although she talked, her pronunciation was so funny. I used to ask her, 'Hey sister, say show, show, show,' and she would say, 'Zow, zow, zow.' It cracked me up all the time. She just looked at me like she did not understand why I was laughing since she pronounced perfect sounds. Therefore, when I got back home from school one day and heard of her talking so fast, I was so shocked. At that time, she talked to me like this, 'Sister, sister, Daddy bought a new telephone. Well, it's red. Hey, the telephone is in the living room. It's a red telephone. The new telephone is on the table in the living room. You know, daddy got the red telephone.' She talked several sentences, which meant almost same thing, in a second and disappeared to a living room probably to look at the new red telephone again. I was standing there for several minutes. 'What was that? My sister could talk?'

In fact, she never stopped talking after that day. When she was in her senior year at high school, she studied until 1 or 2 am at the library. After she got back home, she used to wake me up and tell me what happened to her that day. It was like things that she had done after she got up in the morning until she came back home. She talked about how she got in the bus, what kind of people she saw at the bus, what kind of things happened at school, what she had in lunch time, why she had to eat double portion of meal, what she did at the library and how she came back home, etc. To be honest, I could not understand why she woke me up in the middle of night and talked about those unimportant things. However, I now see how much she made me happy by saying those. Although it was just one ordinary day of life, she made it so special. Everything that happened to her had meaning, and she needed to share it with someone just like me.

The ability to walk and talk brought big changes in her life-She was hardly ever at home. She made lots of friends with her ability to talk and always hung out with them. One day, when I got back home, I saw people gathered together on the street. I was curious so got into them. It was my lovely 5 years old younger sister. She was rolling on the road with two of her friends. She was giggling and seemed not to care that she was risking her life since many cars passing by her. I remember I did not do anything to save her until my mother came and picked her up from the street. I was frozen because of fear of losing her.

My mother and I had to search for her every evening. She was out all day long and did not care about darkness. Her white skin became darker because of suntan, and her knees were covered with bruises. We used to call her on the street to let her know dinner was ready. Sometimes, she saw us looking for her and ran away instead of coming home. She was fast like a squirrel. Then we had to run following her to catch her. When people in our town did not hear her laughter on the street anymore, they said, 'Ah, Jee-Hyun went back home. It's time for dinner.' Actually, we still search for her almost every night although she is now 25 years old. If she has not come back until late night, we would beep her and call her cellular phone and say, 'Where are you? It's time for dinner. Are you coming back home now?' She usually freaks out about our over protection, but what can I say? She is the youngest one in our family, and I never believed she could be a grown up one day.

I must confess that I have tried to control her although I was not aware of that until I write this. I wanted her to go the path that I knew very well. In fact, I wanted her to live just like me. I did not understand why she did not like reading books. Whenever her birthday came, I bought her books although she wanted me to get something else. Sometimes, she read them but sometimes, she did not. When I think of it now, there is no wonder since those were my favorite books, and actually I read them before she read.

When I was working as an educational movement activist, I also wanted her to participate in the educational movement. At that time, clubs at high school were prohibited, and student council was controlled by the school board in Korea. Therefore, it was important to have back students council in students' hands. Actually, she stood as a candidate for the vice president at her high school, and I met her team members to encourage them. Although her team did not win, I was so proud of her for doing that.

When she applied for college, she wanted to apply to a science department. I did not agree with that. I told her she needed to apply to the art department. I said since our older brother enrolled an MBA program, and I was enrolling in law school, the art department would be better for her. In fact, science was not my favorite, so I just could not imagine it could be her favorite subject. She applied to the major which I suggested, but she could not make it. She went to a community college and was major in Chemistry.

When she graduated from community college, she wanted to be a narrator model (A model who introduces new merchandise to customers). In fact, she worked as a narrator model for a while, and she was quite good at it. However, I did not like it at all. Why did she want to have a job like that? Jobs, which she did not have to use her brain, seemed so awkward to me. I never thought a job like modeling could be also her talent at all. I convinced her that the model was an invaluable job, so she should get a better one. I succeeded to change her mind and put her in the English institute where I worked. Although she did a quite good job there, she was not happy. She studied to transfer to four-year college, and only after fifteen days she studied for the exam, she successfully transferred to the university. Of course her major was Chemistry.

To be honest, I also tried to control her marriage. I have negative thoughts about marriage. Marriage will somehow interrupt women's life, and if women can delay it, we need to delay it as long as possible. When she settled in a long relationship with one man, I often asked her if she wanted to marry him. She always answered me, 'I don't know,' and I repeated that she needed to be really careful to choose her husband and develop her own independency before marrying somebody. When she finally decided to marry the man, I did not want her to marry him. If she would marry him, she would have an ordinary life as an ordinary wife. She was so special to me, and I believed she deserved much better. I was a control freak. How would I know about him? How could I possibly say that she should look for other choices?

I know now she has right to have a different life with me. She needs to have a different life with me because she was always different and stronger than me. When I was young, some bullies bothered me on the street. While I was crying not knowing what to do, my 5 years younger sister drove them away with a broom. While I was playing my role as an obedient daughter, she never intended to do that. I must confess I was not able to ride a bike before I came to the U.S. My mother did not want us to have scar or an accident. One day, when my mother and I walked to home, we both saw my sister was riding a bike on the street. My mother was so shocked and stopped her. 'What are you doing? It is a dangerous thing to do! You have to take off now!' My sister just laughed and said, 'It's OK, ma. I've already done this hundreds times. See, I'm OK. It's not dangerous at all!' She disappeared rapidly, and my mother was not able to stop her.

When she entered college, she came back home late almost every night. I was mad and waited her in her bedroom one night. When she saw me, she just asked, 'what are you doing here?' 'That's what I want to ask you. What are you doing? You're young and have more freedom, but you have to be careful with that. Why do you spend your precious time with just hanging out with friends? There are so many things you should know.' She stopped me as I was about to say more. She just looked at me. 'I know what you're trying to say. Are you saying I'm an airhead or something like that? I won't agree with that. Well, you may think my life has less value than yours, but I don't want to live like you. I think your life is boring. Can you say you won't regret about your life some day? What I'm trying to say is, you have your way to go, and I have my way to go. Why don't you go to your bedroom and get some sleep? It's quite late.' I could not say more because she was right. I went to my bedroom and slept like she told me so.

Yes, she was always that way. When I flew to Korea to attend my mother's funeral, I swore to myself that I would do everything for my sister. I remembered her as a baby. When she was a grammar school student, she learned to play piano. She used to practice it and sometimes played beautiful songs. One day when I was listening her piano, it suddenly became so quiet. I went to her, and I saw her crying. I asked her why. She said, 'Sister, this song is so sad. If my mom is gone like this song's lyrics, what am I supposed to do?' She used to slip in our parents'bed in the middle of night until she became a college student. Therefore, she was still the baby who was afraid of darkness to me. However, when I arrived Seoul, she was the one who tried to comfort me. She said to me, 'Don't cry. Our mother must be gone to a better place, so don't cry.' I could not say anything. I was too busy crying.

She was born with her own wings, and I should not attempt to break them in the name of love. As I know my worth, she also knows hers. She must grow up. I only did not see it because I was blind with love for her. When I came to the US two years ago refusing to play an obedient daughter's role anymore, she handed me a letter. She wrote, 'I don't know what you're fighting for, but I'm proud of you. I wish you could find what you're looking for.' Yes, she was already a grown up at that time. I should let her go now. In fact, I should have done that a long time ago.

I look forward to seeing her in March. She will wake me up in the early morning and want me to sit at the table while she is having breakfast. She never wants to eat alone. Then she will say things that happen in her everyday life. I would just listen with sleepy head and smile at her because it would make me a very happy person just to see her talking. How could I not be happy since I have the prettiest, the cutest, the most lovable, the smartest, and the most talkative girl as my sister?